Neonatal cranial ultrasound lesions and developmental delays at 2 years of age among extremely low gestational age children.

Background: Studies of the relationship between ultrasound images from preterm newborns and developmental delay most often are based on small samples defined by birth weight and exclude infants not testable with standardized assessments.

Methods: We evaluated associations between ultrasound-defined lesions of the brain and developmental delays at 24 months' corrected age in 1017 children born before the 28th postmenstrual week. Brain ultrasound scans were read for concordance on 4 lesions: intraventricular hemorrhage, moderate/severe ventriculomegaly, white matter echodense/hyperechoic lesions, and white matter echodense/hypoechoic lesions and 2 diagnoses-periventricular leukomalacia and periventricular hemorrhagic infarction.